Building structures are a fundamental aspect of human existence. Building structures provide the work, living and recreation environments upon which we rely. Large complex buildings, such as for example, work places and multi-family living structures, often require the interaction of many devices during normal use. Some devices in buildings have extensive building system infrastructures.
One common category of building systems having infrastructures are building control systems or building automation systems. Such systems including heating, ventilation and air conditioning (“HVAC”) systems, security systems, fire safety systems, and the like. HVAC systems are typically designed to provide relatively comfortable environmental conditions in which people (or other living things) may work, rest, or otherwise carry on the tasks of life. Security systems operate primarily to ensure only authorized access to or occupancy of a building or portions of building. Fire safety systems operate to detect and provide notice of emergency conditions, as well as to adjust other building systems for proper during operation during an emergency. Such building control systems often require extensive communications to disparate areas of the building and thus incorporate significant physical infrastructure in the form of wiring and cabling, among other things.
However, besides building automation system devices, a building contains hundreds of other devices that also need to be managed for proper operation, maintenance, and service. Such devices may include, by way of example, light fixtures and/or ballasts, photocopiers or reproduction devices, vending machines, coffees machines, water fountains, plumbing fixtures, doors and other similar elements. A specialized building such as laboratory facility for research may contain even more devices that need to managed, in the form of specialized laboratory equipment. Examples of such equipment will include autoclaves, deep freezers, incubators, bio-safety cabinets, oven etc.
These other common building devices do not normally involve an extensive building-wide communication infrastructure. Attempts to obtaining data from each specific device using dedicated communication channel can be extremely cost-prohibitive and technically challenging considering the wiring needs.
While these autonomous, non-communicative building devices do not have the same need for extensive building-wide communication as, for example, a heating system or security alarm system, the operations of such devices is often vital to providing a safe, productive and positive environment. For many building infrastructure devices, such as light fixtures, doors, windows and plumbing, the responsibility for ensuring their proper operation is through a building maintenance services organization. For other building devices, such as vending machines, specialized laboratory or office equipment, the responsibility for ensuring their proper operation is often through specialized service providers.
One issue associated with various building devices is the elapsed time between discovery of a malfunction, communication of the malfunction to the appropriate service provider, and the response time of the provider. Such elapsed time may not have any dangerous or even manifestly costly consequences. However, a poorly maintained building is not conducive to productive and satisfied occupants.
While current service systems for building devices have adequately served the needs of building occupants, it is nevertheless desirable to shorten the lead time between the onset of a building device malfunction and its remedy. Accordingly, there exists a need to improve the maintenance of building devices.